Language and words in the news – 2nd November 2012

This post contains a selection of links related to language and words in the news. These can be items from the latest news, blog posts or interesting websites related to global English, language change, education in general, and language learning and teaching in particular. Feel free to contact us if you would like to submit a link for us to include, or just add a comment to the post, with the link(s) you’d like to share.

Feminism Friday: Sexism, Misogyny and Dictionaries
Since Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s speech a few weeks ago, there’s been a lot of debate about what ‘misogyny’ means, usually instigated by those who accuse Gillard of using the term incorrectly.

Mutant Verbs
Like mutants in nature, most newly minted verbs — Mondayize, speechify, Californicate — will live for only a short while and perish without progeny.

Ain’t This Good English?
As words test the invisible barrier between slang and conventional English, newbs like me are forced to wade in against a constant tide of nonstandard English.

Would of, could of, might of, must of
Unstressed ’ve is phonetically identical (/əv/) to unstressed of: hence the widespread misspellings would of, could of, should of, must of, might of, may of, and ought to of.